We’re hoping to have a good meet here at Belmont and then on the outer track at Aqueduct. A few horses that didn’t win at Saratoga kept their conditions and maybe they’ll get that knocked off, now that we’re back downstate. We also have a lot of two-year-olds who have not had a run yet and they will almost certainly need a run (as most of my two-year-olds do) so when they make their second start they should be extremely competitive.
We’re going to send a few horses to Keeneland to race this year. Not too many (between 6 and 8 horses) but enough that I think we can win some races there. Those specific horses have already been pinpointed to go to Keeneland and hopefully they will be good enough to compete there. Going to Kentucky should provide us a little more exposure and help us to continue to build the stable. We do not have many Kentucky owners in our barn, so we need to expose ourselves to the guys that own, breed, and race there. Kentucky is where the vast majority of horse production comes in North America.
A lot of the bigger farms in Kentucky have horses up here in training in New York but we don’t have many in our barn … whether that’s due to a lack of exposure or people view us as New York operation only. We want to try and grow into a stable that can operate in different states in America. We have done very well running horses in Maryland and New York this year and I want to make sure we are an attractive proposition to the guys based out of Kentucky. We need to make sure they know who we are and then start to believe we can do the job for them. I used to work the Keeneland and Churchill Downs meets for Eddie Keneally so I’m familiar with the territory down there.
This Fall is an important time of the year for us. I recently attented the September Yearling sale at Keeneland and next will be the October Yearling sale. In late October I’ll be going to Europe for the Newmarket sales to buy some grass horses from England … to grow that part of the business.
Yearling sales are much different than two-year-old sales. Buying yearlings is a case of looking at a horse and imagining what he will look like six months or a year down the line. That is where you can find a real bargain. We bought a horse that is “up behind,” meaning his back end was higher than his front end. But, if he grows into a level horse he’ll be a very fast looking individual. He’s a half-brother to Hamazing Destiny, who was 2nd in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint. At the end of the day it’s a bit of a guessing game, where we all think we know what we’re talking about. And remember that every single one of us let American Pharoah walk through the ring at the Saratoga Yearling sale for $300,000 and no one bought him. So we obviously don’t all know that much!
When it comes to yearling purchases, I tell my owners, “If you want to take the next step and be playing with West Point and Team Valor, then you have to get involved with young horses in order to buy better quality horses.” Of course a lot of them aren’t going to work out, but you have to be realistic about that. You’ve got much more chance of going to the Derby with a horse that you started with, broken by who you want it to be broken by, and trained as you wish, not letting it spend a year beforehand with someone else.
I personally bought a Shackleford horse at the sales. He’s a half-brother to a horse named Three Alarm Fire, who beat Liam’s Map in an allowance race. I plan to sell him in the breeze up sales or sell him beforehand. But I do like the horse enough to keep him in my barn, so if someone wants to come in and take a piece of him or own him outright, then he’s for sale.
Looking beyond the Fall, we have a lot of two-year-old horses in the stable now. Mike Piazza has been very supportive at the sales and three or four of the other owners have sent us nice homebreds as well. These two-turning-three year olds need to be given a chance to winter in Florida rather than here in the freezing cold. Then we’ll see if they can graduate into nice horses next year. So the plan remains to send some horses to Florida in the winter.
Splitting the stable and attending all of these sales is part of my life as a trainer now. Of course I’d like to be with my horses all the time, but if you want to grow and expand you have to be able to delegate as well. Pearl and Sarah are terrific girls, doing do a terrific job, and Sue Duncan as well. After I returned from the Yearling sales in Kentucky my first two runners ran well, finishing second and third. These people know what they’re doing when preparing a horse to run and I feel fortunate that I have an excellent team underneath me.
– Tom Morley
